In terms of stringently avoiding easy pigeonholing, it must be said there are few currently working harder than Seattle quartet PRETTY GIRLS MAKE GRAVES. I mean, just think about it for a moment: their name is culled from a Smiths song; they've got a sound pitched somewhere between early '80s heroes such as Gang Of Four and current NYC boho hipsters The Rapture and bear little resemblance to anything previously from Seattle. Not to mention the fact their album is housed in a strange, but visually arresting sleeve with a weird inlay photo influenced by Aphex Twin collaborator Chris Cunningham.
Confused? Ya sure will be, but you'll also be intrigued by PGMG'S spiky punk-funk shapes and dark-haired riot (pin up) grrrl Andrea Zollo's bags of presence throughout this awkward but often startling second album (there's an obscure debut called "Good Health" kicking about out there) that never once chooses the easy option en route.
Ranging from sinister to dramatic and all points in between, opener "Something Bigger, Something Brighter" alone has more ideas than the average think tank at an international symposium and sets the precedent with Nathan Thelen and J.Clark's guitars buckling and bending, rhythm section Derek Fudesco and drummer Nick Dewitt not so much trying to keep it on the rails as maniacally pushing the band even further out and Zollo soaring like a spectacularly scuzzed-up angel.
Challenging stuff, and when they push similarly exciting buttons on tracks like "The Grandmother Wolf" and "Chemical, Chemical" and let some unbridled rocking into the cerebrality, they certainly get my vote. The three songs reprised from their recent EP are all excellent, too. "This Is Our Emergency" is by some way the most consistently anthemic thing here and grows stronger with repeated listens, while the stinging riffing and whiplash fury of "All Medicated Geniuses" brims with tension and the deranged creepathon of "Blue Lights" works even better for reining in the jerky funk. "Hello, I'm neurotic", breathes Zollo to introduce this one and you're in no doubt you're in the presence of one of the year's weirdest come-ons.
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It doesn't all work so well, mind. Despite being infused with the band's naturally frantic exuberance, tracks like "The Teeth Collector" and "Holy Names" are victories of style over content and the latter in particular runs screaming from the 'decent tune' detector, while both "Mr.Club" and seventh track, the wittily-monikered "7", are little more than electronic dickarounds which purely irritate rather than act as linking tracks. Pah! At times like these, the clever-clever approach palls rapidly and you long for more of "This Is Our Emergency"s in-your-face urgency. Oh well, next time.
Obviously it helps that in Andrea Zollo, PRETTY GIRLS MAKE GRAVES have an indie boy's wet dream (Siouxsie scraps with Karen O, anyone?), but in spiritual terms they recall a host of unsung US heroes such as Firehose and Volcano Suns in their tangible desire to keep pushing it out there and explore in a funky stylee. Even allowing for the current punk-funk vogue, "The New Romance" is nervily effective stuff and I get the feeling they'll continue to do better in the future.
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